Page 7 of Falling for the Grumpy Orc (Monsters of Saltford Bay #1)
I sit up straighter, my thick fingers tapping against my coffee mug. A flash of those hazel eyes burning with fury shoots inside my brain. Then I see it, perfect as in a picture. Her soft, round lips, pressed together into a rosebud pout.
How much I'd wanted to press those lips to mine, feel them nestle right between my tusks.
And that's exactly why I had to say no, because just looking at her had made something warm and dangerous unfurl in my gut, like a hook that hurt and felt good at the same time. Because her bright, infectious smile had nearly cracked my resolve right then and there.
"She did pay me a visit, and she did want to hire me." I hear the ice in my voice and I hate it. "I turned her down."
Evelyn Primrose gasps theatrically .
"Gerralt," Bernice says with a voice as smooth and soft as poison. "Why would you do such a thing?"
All the while, Evelyn stares at me like she's as surprised as Bernice, but I know she already heard all the juicy gossip from one townie or another. No one in this town knows how to mind their own business.
“Because she doesn’t know the first thing about restoring an old place like that,” I reply flatly, ignoring the way my grandmother looks at me like she wants to practice her knife throwing on my face.
Which I’m not putting past her. For the first time in a long while, I'm reminded that Bernice was born and raised in the old ways. She's not one to be trifled with. “I don’t have time to hold some city girl’s hand while she learns the difference between a wrench and a screwdriver.”
Evelyn Primrose gives Bernice a look that practically radiates, Can you even believe this man? Like she didn't orchestrate the whole fiasco. I turn my gaze to my grandmother, who looks at me with the kind of look that makes a grown man squirm like a schoolboy.
"Is that how I raised you?" Bernice frowns and her mouth takes that turn that used to make me feel like crawling under the bed as a boy. “To leave an innocent woman without help or support?”
Bernice's eyes bore holes in my brains and I feel the burn as she brings her teacup down on the table just hard enough to rattle the plate underneath.
“She will find someone else to help her,” I grumble. “She’ll be fine.”
Evelyn Primrose chuckles delicately, like she’s just heard the punchline of a joke only she finds funny. That’s when I know she’s about to drop something big.
“Well,” she purrs. “As it happens, she might have found herself another contractor already. ”
I stiffen, my eyes narrowing against my better judgment. “Who? Someone I know?”
“Oh, you know him alright,” Evelyn says, her tone light but her tongue full of acid. “It's Bogdan Ashvale.”
The name cuts through me like a freezing gust of wind. Bernice sucks in a sharp breath, her amber eyes widening in her slim face. Her forest-green skin pales until it looks like she's seen a ghost.
Evelyn must see the ripple of tension between us because she presses on, barely able to suppress her excitement.
“Mrs. Marwick at the hardware store told me she saw him chatting her up just this morning in her establishment. He was all over that poor girl with talks of asbestos and mold remediation and how costly it was all going to be. Practically wagging his tail, he was.”
“That bastard,” Bernice mutters, loud enough to make the pixies at the other table stop giggling and glance over their shoulder.
I grip the edge of the table tightly. Bogdan Ashvale is a snake. The kind of contractor who cuts corners so aggressively, he leaves buildings teetering on stilts and clients drowning in regrets. And Cassidy, with her wide eyes and too-bright smile, has no idea what she’s getting herself into.
“I can almost picture his swagger when he walked away from that girl,” Evelyn says, and now she’s looking directly at me. “Like he already owns the place. He probably thinks he can bleed her dry, then force her to sell at a loss.”
I push my plate away, appetite gone.
“That’s not my problem.”
Bernice leans forward, her voice suddenly low and steely. When her fingers close around my wrist, I know I'm in trouble .
“You know what that man is capable of,” she hisses, her lips sticking to her tusks as she speaks, a sure sign that emotions overwhelm her. “So why are you letting him ruin the only thing this Cassandra girl’s got going for her?”
“Cassidy,” I correct under my breath, not knowing why I feel the need to. "Her name is Cassidy."
"Cassidy, is it?" Bernice's shrewd eyes see right through me as I squirm on the booth like a teenager. "She left that much of an impression on you?"
“Too bad she's going to be gone soon,” Evelyn Primrose teases. “And without a penny to her name, I’d wager.”
I slide out from the booth, then drop a small stack of bills on the table without looking at either woman.
“I’ll handle it.”
“Oh, I’m sure you will,” Evelyn Primrose murmurs behind me, smugness dripping from every syllable.
The crisp air outside hits me like a slap as I step onto the cobblestone street. Somewhere in the distance, seagulls cry over the waves, their sharp voices barely carrying over the muted hum of town activity.
I pause by my truck, the engine still warm from the drive over. My fists clench and unclench as Cassidy’s stubborn, determined face shoots back in my mind. She's the kind of girl Bogdan Ashvale would chew up and spit out without hesitation.
With a growl low in my throat, I yank open the truck door and climb inside.
The lodge isn’t my problem. But Cassidy Perkins just might be.